Universal Has Second Thoughts On MLK Assassination Movie ‘Memphis’

It was reported a while back that shaky-cam auteur Paul Greengrass was working on a movie about the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr called Memphis. Now, the studio that had been developing this movie, Universal, is dropping out, citing scheduling issues and the fact that it probably wouldn’t be finished before the planned MLK day weekend 2012 release.

Some are speculating that these aren’t the only reasons for the abrupt halting of production, though. Apparently the MLK estate has had serious objections about the content of the film – although it isn’t known if this is because of controversial subject matter, or because there’s another MLK movie in development at Dreamworks which is being made with the full approval of the King estate. Either way, Greengrass and Co. are now looking for new financiers to keep the movie going. Maybe the city of Memphis would want to throw in a few bucks – no such thing as bad publicity, right? (via Deadline)